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A Greeley man was killed Tuesday in a car versus semi truck crash northeast of Gill.

Carlos Mejia, 29, died at the scene of a crash that happened about 11:50 a.m. Tuesday at Colo. 392 and Weld County Road 57, according to the Colorado State Patrol and the Weld County Coroner’s Office.

CSP Sgt. Dennis Schenkenberger said a preliminary investigation of the crash indicated a Honda driven by one of Mejia’s relatives was traveling east on Colo. 392 when the driver slowed to turn left onto Weld 57.

He said CSP’s investigation indicates the driver of the semi, which was also traveling east on Colo. 392, failed to yield to the Honda and crashed into the back of it.

Information on others involved in the crash, including the name of the driver of the semi, was not made available Tuesday.

Colo. 392 was closed for nearly three hours Tuesday afternoon while the crash was investigated and debris was cleared from the roadway.

Mejia is the 19th person to die on Weld County roads this year. Through July 8 of last year, 15 people had died.

Tuesday’s crash on Colo. 392 occurred about one mile from a triple-fatality crash in late June. That crash — in which two 22-year-olds from Greeley and an 18-year-old from Evans were killed — also involved a semi truck and a passenger car.

Steve Reams, public safety bureau chief for the Weld County Sheriff’s Office, said added traffic on Colo. 392 has the sheriff’s office looking at different ways to patrol the area.

He said an easy solution to the fatal accidents has been elusive.

“We’re still trying to get our mind around these fatality crashes,” Reams said. “There’s been added traffic altogether on 392. We’re seeing a lot of oil field traffic. But in previous crashes, the problem has been drivers who miss a stop sign or don’t realize these are high-speed roads. Most of these crashes aren’t speed-related; it’s a traffic control device.”

Colo. 392 is a state highway and is therefore predominately patrolled by the state patrol.

“We can’t dedicate someone to sit out there 24/7 to do traffic enforcement,” Reams said. “But these crashes are tough on us, too. Nobody likes to work fatality crashes. We’re trying to figure out the best solution. We just don’t know it yet.”

Schenkenberger said troopers feel equally constrained when it comes to monitoring the increasing traffic on Colo. 392.

“We try to patrol out there when we can,” Schenkenberger said, “but it’s a large geographical area. We try to put people where the accidents are happening and, if you just look at the sheer number of injury and DUI crashes, the majority of them happen on I-25 and U.S. 85.”

That doesn’t mean Colo. 392 and other more rural highways in the county aren’t a priority for CSP, Schenkenberger said. In fact, he said the booming oil and gas industry has led the agency to view those areas as a growing priority.

“It’s not just the actual rigs being drilled or the trucks carrying the oil,” Schenkenberger said. “You have every guy who works out there coming and going from hotels in Cheyenne or Greeley. There’s just more traffic than was designed for these roads 40 or 50 years ago.”

Schenkenberger said CSP is planning to make the areas where oil and gas activity is growing a focus in the coming year, and it won’t be only troopers who will be involved in the process.

“We’re going to work with our partners to address these issues, including county and community officials,” he said. “We’ve already had preliminary discussions with our hazmat crews and commercial vehicle guys.”

The feeling at the sheriff’s office that something must be done quickly to react to the apparent spike in traffic fatalities is shared by state patrol, Schenkenberger said.

“Any time there’s a fatal crash, it’s obviously horrible,” he said. “Any time we see a little bump (in the number of traffic deaths), we know we need to get a handle on it.”